He came up with the idea for what is now the annual Flame Challenge after recalling a moment when he was 11 and asked his teacher, “What is a flame?”

Her answer was “oxidation.” He didn’t find that particularly illuminating.

This is the first year with a cash award. (The contest is now sponsored by the American Chemical Society and American Association for the Advancement of Science.)

If you’re a particularly communicative scientist (the definition in the contest rules is broad), you could win $1,000 and a trip to the World Science Festival in New York City next May if you come up with an answer — in words, graphics or video — that middle-school students embrace.

Here’s a bit more from a Stony Brook news release:

This year’s question, “What is sleep?” was submitted by Ms. Wohlberg’s sixth grade class from Garden City Middle School in New York. Several other students from around the country asked related questions, such as “What are dreams?” In an online poll of children about the next Flame Challenge question, “What is sleep” strongly outpolled questions about electricity, wind, germs and how scientific discoveries are made.

“This is the first Flame Challenge that asks a question about something that happens inside our brains and our bodies,” said Elizabeth Bass, director of the Alda Center. “We hope that inspires past Flame Challenge contestants to try again, and also attracts people in psychology, medicine and all the cognitive sciences. But the winners don’t necessarily have to be specialists in the topic — they mainly have to focus on understanding what 11-year-olds might know and care about.”

At the Flame Challenge website, www.FlameChallenge.org, scientists can find more information on entering the contest, and teachers can find information on having their classes participate as judges. The website also contains past winning entries and tips from past winners about crafting a good entry.

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By 2050 or so, the human population is expected to pass nine billion. Those billions will be seeking food, water and other resources on a planet where humans are already shaping climate and the web of life. Dot Earth was created by Andrew Revkin in October 2007 -- in part with support from a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship -- to explore ways to balance human needs and the planet's limits.